Quickstart

This page walks you through the most common use cases in five minutes.

Basic workflow

Every ExcelTableKit session follows the same three-step pattern:

Open or create a .xlsx file with ExcelManager.
Define the table range and, optionally, which rows are headers.
Apply styles through ExcelStyle.

from exceltablekit import ExcelManager, ExcelStyle

# 1. Open (or create) the file
excel = ExcelManager("output.xlsx")

# 2. Define the table range A1:D10, with 1 header row
excel.set_table("A1", "D10")
excel.define_header(rows=1)

# 3. Apply styles
style = ExcelStyle(excel)
style.set_header_background("1F4E79")      # dark-blue header
style.set_header_font(bold=True, hex_color="FFFFFF")  # white bold text
style.set_background("E8F4FD")             # light-blue body
style.set_border()                          # thin black borders everywhere
style.auto_fit_columns()                   # column widths fit content

The file is saved automatically after every style method call.

Styling the body

Use ExcelStyle methods prefixed with set_ (without header_) to target only the body rows.

style.set_background("FFFACD")            # lemon chiffon background
style.set_font(
    type="Calibri",
    size=11.0,
    bold=False,
    italic=False,
    hex_color="000000",
)
style.set_alignment(horizontal="center", vertical="center")
style.set_border(
    left=True, left_style="thin",
    right=True, right_style="thin",
    top=True, top_style="thin",
    bottom=True, bottom_style="thin",
    hex_color="AAAAAA",
)

Styling the header

Mirror methods with the header_ prefix target only the designated header rows.

excel.set_table("A1", "F20")
excel.define_header(rows=2)       # rows 1 and 2 are headers

style = ExcelStyle(excel)
style.set_header_background("2E75B6")
style.set_header_font(bold=True, size=12.0, hex_color="FFFFFF")
style.set_header_alignment(horizontal="center")
style.set_header_border()
style.freeze_header()              # freeze rows 1-2 while scrolling

Working with an existing file and a specific sheet

# Load an existing file and target the sheet named "Sales"
excel = ExcelManager("report.xlsx", sheetname="Sales")
excel.set_table("B2", "G50")
excel.define_header(rows=1)

style = ExcelStyle(excel)
style.set_background("F2F2F2")
style.set_border()

Creating a new sheet inside an existing file

excel = ExcelManager(
    "report.xlsx",
    create_sheet=True,
    sheetname="Q2 Results",
)

If the file does not exist yet it is created on the fly. If the sheet already exists inside the file, the existing one is reused.

Applying a style to the whole table at once

Use apply_style_table on the manager directly when you want the same openpyxl style object to hit every cell (header + body) without constructing an ExcelStyle instance.

from openpyxl.styles import Alignment

excel = ExcelManager("output.xlsx")
excel.set_table("A1", "D10")
excel.define_header(rows=1)
excel.apply_style_table("alignment", Alignment(horizontal="center"))

Using the CLI

ExcelTableKit ships with a small command-line interface so you can apply a standard style without writing any Python:

exceltablekit style output.xlsx \
    --start A1 \
    --end D10 \
    --header-rows 1 \
    --header-bg 1F4E79 \
    --bg E8F4FD \
    --border-style thin

See Command-Line Interface for the full CLI reference.

Note

All hex color values are passed without the leading # character. For example, use "1F4E79" rather than "#1F4E79".